Rurouni Buffy
by Camigwen -n- Maara
Summary: [BtVS/Rurouni Kenshin] After Kenshin's death, his sword landed in the hands of the Watcher's Council, only to be accidently taken by Giles before the Council's demise. Now, the sword is in the hands of the Slayer...


**Rurouni Buffy**

By: Camigwen & Maara

-Chapter 1-

"Books, books, books…thing in jar, not asking…" Buffy tossed aside the various items from Giles's trunk that was full of things that were some of the last remnants of the Watcher's Council. Damn, there was nothing good in this trunk, just a bunch of books and creepy watcher stuff. 

More useless things were tossed aside until she came upon a large object at the bottom of the trunk. "Wait, what's this?"

She pulled out a leather bound bundle, that didn't weigh as much as she expected it too. Placing the bundle on the table in front of her, she undid the lacing and peeled back the layers of aged leather that almost fell apart in her hands. Underneath, she was shocked to find a shining brown sheath.

Freeing the sword from its container, Buffy felt strong power wash over her. She stared in awe at the remarkable blade. It was unlike any style of blade she'd used, but looked more like the swords from those old Samurai movies Xander used to watch.

She reached to touch the cool metal and yelped as she pulled her hand back, surprised that the blade had bit into her flesh. That was odd; the blade was on the wrong side. "What?" She set the blade onto the table and as soon as she let go, she felt the power ebb. 

"Giles!"

The watcher came running in from the other room. "Buffy, what is it?"

She thrust her bleeding palm at the watcher. "Look!"

"You've cut yourself…and have strewn through my belongings," he said taking note of the mess thrown about the room.

Buffy smiled sheepishly and gave a small shrug. "Mostly just a bunch of old beat up books, but I did find a cool sword! What's it do?" She pointed to the sword on the table.

Giles blinked, taken aback. He hadn't recalled brining a katana with him. "Where'd you find that?"

"At the bottom of that rusty trunk of yours wrapped in stinky old leather. So, what's it do?"

"Do?"

"Well, it's gotta do something besides slicing and dicing. I mean, come on, it's a bit tingly and it's backwards. It's not exactly gonna hurt anybody."

Giles picked up the sword, wondering why he hadn't felt anything odd about it before. "What exactly do you mean by 'tingly'?"

"You know, tingly. Magic tingly," Buffy said.

Giles concentrated and after a few moments was able to feel the slight hum of magic. Something was hiding the magic before. "Interesting. Although, I don't understand why there's a ward on this katana."

The blonde Slayer arched a brow. "Catch a what?"

"Ka-ta-na, it's a Japanese sword." Giles said offhandedly. "Though I'm at a loss to explain why it would be warded unless it has some higher significance than merely a weapon."

"Yeah," Buffy said, "So, again, what does it do?"  

Giles looked at the petite slayer thoughtfully, "We won't know until the ward can be broken, but I wouldn't suggest attempting that until we know more about the sword's purpose.  I thought I heard something about a legendary sword being shipped from Japan…" Giles trailed off as he began to rummage through the ancient, leather, bound texts he had rescued. "There were stories of a warrior with a reverse-blade sword helping to sway the tide of the revolution in Japan and then suddenly the stories stopped. The man was assumed dead." 

Still distracted Giles walked out of the living room toward the basement were the rest of his books were kept. Buffy replaced the sword in its sheath before following her watcher.   

Down in the basement Buffy saw that Spike was curled up on a cot in the corner of the room. She smiled at the still sleeping vampire, or whatever it was that the undead did when they weren't awake.

Giles glided past the blonde vampire without causing him to shift, but when Buffy walked past, one blue eye opened and starred up at her. 

"What are you doing at this hour?" Spike asked groggily.

Buffy laughed slightly and shook her head. "Spike, it's two in the afternoon. Normal people are awake right now."

Spike reached behind him and grabbed one of the many pillows. "Well, normal _vampires_ are _asleep right now." He rolled over so that he was facing the wall and held the pillow over his head._

The Slayer shrugged and strolled over to where Giles was rummaging through a disheveled pile of books. 

"I don't understand why this sword was among the items kept at the Watcher's Council. It's a legendary historical Japanese artifact. Now where did I put those bloody Japanese texts?"

Buffy glanced down at her feet where a beaten old book laid and bent down and picked it up. "Hey Giles, what's up with this funky writing. Is this Egyptian?"

"Revolution of the Meigi Era, eh?"

Buffy tilted her head up to look at Spike. "I thought you were asleep. And how did you learn to read Egyptian?"

"You woke me up and now I can't get back to sleep. And it's not Egyptian. Egyptian writing uses hieroglyphics. This is kanji. It's Japanese, pet."

Giles stood and tossed aside the text he had been flipping through and snatched the book out of Buffy's grasp. He flipped through the first few pages, before fiddling with his glasses and flipping back to the cover. "Yes, I believe, this is one of the texts I was looking for."

Buffy shrugged and headed back up the stairs with Giles and Spike in tow. "So, Giles, that book of yours will be able to tell us what that sword does?"

The watcher shrugged. "I'm not quite sure. But, hopefully it will give us some more insight on the sword's origin. I have an idea of where it came from…but, I want to be certain."

"What about that ward?" Buffy asked as she reached the top of the basement stairs and turned to face them.

"Well," Giles said, "perhaps we could do a spell to break it…"

"Spell?"

The Slayer, watcher, and vampire turned to face the bright smile of Willow, a magic book held tightly in her arms. She set the book down on the table next to the sword. "I had a feeling I'd be needing this today."

Giles gave her a weary smile. "Willow, I'm not sure if it's a good idea for you to perform this spell. We don't know what will happen once the ward has been removed."

The redheaded witch placed both hands on her hips and raised an eyebrow at the watcher. "And you're proposing that _you perform the spell?"_

"Well…yes. Besides, you can't even read Japanese."

"Yes I can." Willow pointed to several difficult looking kanji, "See? This passage talks about weapons forged before the 19th century." Willow looked up expectantly.

"Well I honestly wouldn't know," said Giles "archaic Japanese is one of the few languages I'm not fluent in".  

Spike looked over Willow's shoulder, "Pretty close kitten, but this line doesn't make any sense it mentions something about a reverse blade sword. Whatever the hell that is. Must have been copied wrong. There's no such thing as a reverse blade sword—ah!" The vampire leaped back as a sword was thrust under his nose. He shot Buffy a frightened look. "Buffy…"

"Reverse blade sword in the flesh, or steel." The Slayer said with a grin as she pulled the sword back and handed it over for Spike to investigate.

The vampire gladly took the sword from her and took a few practice swings, nearly knocking over a vase. Spike was surprised at the sword's excellent balance and feather like weight. "Good sword, seems a bit puny though, not really a manly sword. They must have had women warriors back in the dark ages".

Smirking a little, Willow thrust the book back at Spike who had put the sword back in its sheath. "Spike, the sword belonged to a man."  

Spike looked down at the woodcarving in the book and snorted.  How could Willow be sure that that was a man? Spike paused, the pictured looked familiar. He shrugged maybe he had seen the guy in his stint in Japan back when Angelus was evil. 

Willow grinned and took the book from him. "So, what exactly is the ward on?"

Giles picked up Willow's magic book and handed it to her. He grabbed her by the elbow with one hand and grabbed the sheathed sword with his other and proceeded to lead Willow into the living room.

"Sword's got some magical ward on it?" Spike inquired when Giles and Willow were out of earshot.

"Yeah," Buffy said. "Pretty powerful too, at least if felt powerful to me. It was all tingly when I picked it up." She shrugged. "Willow and Giles will figure it out."

Spike shrugged. "Yeah, probably so. They're the book and magic types. We're the sit back and watch types."

Buffy nodded and began to walk through the doorway into the other room. "And I'll go do my sitting and watching."

"Buffy."

She whirled around. "Yes?"

"Can you…" He pointed to the wound on Buffy's hand from touching the blade of the sword earlier. "…bandage that. The sent is making my tummy all rumbly and sorts. Speaking of which, I think I'll go get something to eat."

Buffy watched him stroll off in the direction of the kitchen and glanced down at her hand. She'd been so wrapped up in looking for that text that she'd neglected to take care of her wound. Groaning, she headed up stairs to find the ointment and bandages.

+§¤§+

After shooing away a couple of potentials who were lingering about in the living room, Willow sat down in the middle of the floor, removed the sword from its sheath, and laid it before her.

"Ready Will?" Xander, who among Giles, Anya, Faith, Dawn, and Kennedy, were the only people she allowed to be in the room with her, incase the spell went boom.

Willow nodded, even though Buffy wasn't yet in the room, she'd go ahead and start the spell. Buffy was probably still in the other room with Spike, and she didn't want to know what they were doing in there.

With a last glance over at the open books lying on the floor to her side, she placed her hands over the sword, closed her eyes, and began to speak the incantation in what she hoped was well-pronounced Japanese.

Nothing happened.

Damn it! Had she pronounced it wrong? She'd try again.

Closing her eyes and concentrating only on the magic aura that surrounded the sword. Hopefully it would work this ti—"Whoa."

"Willow?" Kennedy leaned forward to place her hand on Willow's shoulder, but the witch shook her head.

"No, wait. I think I've got it." She focused her mind on the ward and slowly began to pick it apart. One by one, she pulled the layers of the ward away, getting closer and closer to the secret behind the ward. She came to the last layer, and froze as power washed over her and her world began to go black. 

"K-Kennedy!"

+§¤§+

Buffy stood before the bathroom sink, lightly dabbing at her wound with a dark green towel. She felt a shiver trail up her spin and her hand began to feel hot. She moved to turn the cold water on, when she involuntarily fell to the floor. She blinked rapidly, trying the shove away the darkness that slowly crept upon her.

"N-no…!" She tried to fight it, but it caught her up within its grasps and set her falling down a dark whirling tunnel.

**TBC**

**Disclaimer:** We do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer of Rurouni Kenshin.  This is for fun only. Please don't sue, as we are both broke. Such is the life of college students. 

6/02/03


End file.
